Seniors are likelier to get prescribed risky drugs, especially those living in Southern states according to a recent study at Brown University. Nearly one in five Southern seniors on Medicare has been prescribed potentially harmful drugs which have been advised against for people over 65.

As for the geographical differences, there was a 12 percent higher likelihood that an elderly person would get dangerous drugs in the South as opposed to places like New England. Factors like economic status, education, and quality of care are likely the cause of these regional differences.

The National Committee for Quality Assurance  created a list of over one hundred drugs which should be avoided by the elderly which includes things like benzodiazepines, and other anti-anxiety medications. Valium and similar others are not as easily metabolized in the elderly, so it stays in their system for a prolonged period of time. Muscle relaxers and diabetes medications can also have the same effect of staying in an older person’s system  too long to where it could become a serious danger.

Albany, Georgia had the highest amount of risky drugs prescribed, with nearly 40% of seniors on potentially harmful drugs. Alexandria, Louisiana was the city with the second highest concentration of dangerous prescriptions to the elderly.

Another widespread problem deals with polypharmacy, commonly known as using multiple medications. On average, a person over 65 is on about about four different prescription drugs, which can potentially lead to drug interactions. It is speculated that one third of hospital admissions is from are rooted in polypharmacy.

If you or a loved one has suffered from bad drugs or adverse drug interactions, make sure to contact an experienced drug attorney right away.

The use of highly potent cholesterol lowering drugs called statins have been linked to an increase in a person’s risk of developing kidney failure, a new study suggests. The research suggests that high potency versions of statin pills as opposed to low-potency pills are linked to slight elevated rates of kidney injury.

The study, which was conducted in different institutions and labs across Canada, estimates that for every 1,700 people who use high dose statins for a period of four-months, you would expect to see one person hospitalized.

While this number may seem insignificant the fact that there is widespread use of these statins can be cause for concern. According to the research “tens of millions” of North Americans are currently using these drugs so even side effects that are relatively uncommon are important to keep under control.

The research was conducted by the Canadian Network for Observational Drug Effect Studies, which is funded by Health Canada. The study was published in the medical journal BMJ. The data for the study was pulled from databases from seven Canadian provinces as well as from Britain and the United States. The study encompassed people aged 40 and older who had started taking statins between 1997 and 2008.

About 1/3 of the over 2 million people included in the study were administered the high-potency statins. High potency statins are defined as 10 milligrams or more of the active ingredient rosuvastatin, or as it is known commercially Crestor, 20 mg atorvastatin, which is sold as Lipitor, or 40 mg of simvastatin which is sold in pharmacies as Zocor.

Health Canada urges anybody who is currently taking a high-dose of statins to consult their physician to see if they may need to change their drug regimen.

Occasionally the dangers associated with taking a drug far outweigh the ailment that initially called for it to be prescribed. Drug-makers Merck, Bristol-Myers Squibb and Novo Nordisk, major manufacturers of diabetes drugs, are now being scrutinized for their reported link to pancreatic cancer.

The FDA is now launching an investigation into the side effects these drugs produce. The agency has already received a high number of reports indicating that users of these specialized drugs developed pancreatic cancer, devastating consequences for those simply trying to maintain quality of life amidst diabetes.

The problem with many bad drugs is the side effects are not readily apparent. Regardless of a company advertising the consequences or not, the harsh penalties associated with these drugs sometimes aren’t displayed for years. Trying to prevent the fatal consequences is a delicate process that requires fast legal proceedings and community awareness.

The FDA, deeming the diabetic drug complaints have reached a critical level, will now be investigating the unpublished findings from these major manufacturers. The FDA investigation will likely take a significant length of time, but the outcome could result a hefty bill to the manufacturers for significant damages stemming from a large list of complaints.

The US Navy has now joined the war on bath salts, launching their own PSA against the synthetic drug growing in popularity. The drug remains easily accessible in many areas of the country. Many packages of bath salts include the warning, ‘not for human consumption’, as a simple method of skirting the law.

Bath salts, named for its resemblance to legal bathing products like epsom salts, operates quite differently. The drug generally contains substituted cathinones, providing a similar effect as amphetamine and cocaine.

Following a string of high profile national incidents, the US Navy has issued a warning to potential sailors enlisting for service, cautioning them of the dangerous hallucinatory affects associated with bath salts.

The video depicts an active service member snorting a line of bath salts with disastrous consequences, a shocking display that’s successfully turned a lot of heads. The hellish commercial displays an act of physical abuse and ends with the sailor being forcibly restrained to a gurney.

As the drug is relatively new to the market, there’s little in the way of research of the effect is has over the body. Many believe chronic bath salts abuse can actually cause disruptive and permanent changes within the brain of the user.

Now a nationally televised Navy PSA seems to creating greater awareness.

The internet continues to play a key role in almost every aspect of our lives, now it has even began helping in the detection of drug side effects before the FDA. From analyzing the queries of popular search engines, it can potentially help reveal medical risks that were undetected in clinical trials.

In 2010, researchers looked into queries relating to Paroxentine, an antidepressant and pravastatin, a cholesterol lowering drug and concluded that taking the two together resulted in higher blood sugar. People who were googling “Paroxentine and Pravastatin” helped them determine that these two had some sort of correlation. One in ten of the people who used a search engine also searched for hypoglycemia as well.  Researchers then found that in 81% of time, people were likely to become hypoglycemic while taking the drug combination based off the searches. These data mining techniques are similar to the ways that Google compiles its flu trends, which has been a useful warning to the public.

Some scientists are now pressing Google and other resources, like Bing and Yahoo, to monitor these kinds of searches then send them to the FDA for further investigation. Although bio-medical professionals are unsure of how much these observations will help, they do want to explore the usefulness of data mining.

Typically, the FDA receives this kind of drug side-effect information through the Adverse Event Reporting System, which only contains reports from doctors, not patients. The reach of this of data is limited, because all of the symptoms which are reported are that of the doctor’s observations. If you have been the victim of a drug’s side effect, make sure to contact an attorney who can hold the right people accountable, and get you the compensation you deserve.